A known sunroof device disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication Laid-open JP07-149153 published on Jun. 13, 1995. The sunroof device includes a roof panel for forming an exterior of a vehicle and having an outer opening portion, a ceiling member for forming a ceiling of a vehicle interior (i.e. interior space of a vehicle) below the roof panel, a slide panel moved between a closed position in which the outer opening portion is closed and an open position in which the outer opening portion is open, and a drive mechanism for moving the slide panel in a vehicle forward direction so as to close the outer opening portion. In addition, an operating portion is provided on the ceiling member so as to operate the drive mechanism. Further, an inner opening portion is formed on the ceiling member so as to face the outer opening portion of the roof panel. The inner opening portion is arranged below the outer opening portion. A front edge of the outer opening portion is positioned on a front side in the vehicle relative to a front edge of the inner opening portion.
According to the aforementioned sunroof device, the front edge of the outer opening portion is positioned on a front side in the vehicle relative to the front edge of the inner opening portion. Thus, when a passenger in a vehicle intends to close the outer opening portion, the slide panel moving in the vehicle forward direction passes over the front edge of the inner opening portion and closes the inner opening portion of the ceiling member before the outer opening portion of the roof panel is completely closed. That is, depending on a timing of the drive mechanism to stop, it may be possible that the outer opening portion is not completely closed even if the inner opening portion is closed by the slide panel. Therefore, the passenger in the vehicle interior may wrongly recognize that the outer opening portion is closed as well as the inner opening portion even though the outer opening portion is actually not completely closed.
According to the sunroof device disclosed, an opening portion may not be completely closed even if a passenger intends to close the opening portion because of an incomplete closed position of the slide panel.
Thus, a need exists for a sunroof device that can prevent a slide panel from stopping in an incomplete closed position.